Islamist assault on Iraq threatens Mideast as whole, experts warn

REUTERS - Volunteers from the Shi'ite Badr Organization, who have joined the Iraqi army to fight against the predominantly Sunni militants from the radical Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) who have taken over Mosul and other northern provinces, chant slogans in Basra June 14, 2014. Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki told army officers in the city of Samarra that volunteers were arriving to help defeat Islamist militants who have swept through Sunni Muslim territory towards Baghdad.

REUTERS - Members of Iraqi security forces and tribal fighters take part in an intensive security deployment on the outskirts of Diyala province June 13, 2014. In a rare intervention at Friday prayers in the holy city of Kerbala, a message from Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, who is the highest religious authority for Shi'ites in Iraq, said people should unite to fight back against a lightning advance by militants from the radical Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant.

REUTERS - Members of Iraqi security forces and tribal fighters take part in an intensive security deployment on the outskirts of Diyala province June 13, 2014.

REUTERS - Iran's President Hassan Rouhani attends a news conference in Tehran June 14, 2014. Iran could contemplate cooperating with its old adversary the United States on restoring security to Iraq if it saw Washington confronting 'terrorist groups in Iraq and elsewhere', Rouhani said on Saturday.

REUTERS - Volunteers, who have joined the Iraqi Army to fight against the predominantly Sunni militants who have taken over Mosul and other Northern provinces, travel in army trucks in Baghdad June 14, 2014. Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki told army officers in the city of Samarra that volunteers were arriving to help defeat Islamist militants who have swept through Sunni Muslim territory towards Baghdad.

REUTERS - Volunteers, who have joined the Iraqi Army to fight against the predominantly Sunni militants who have taken over Mosul and other Northern provinces, travel in army trucks in Baghdad June 14, 2014.

REUTERS - Volunteers, who have joined the Iraqi army to fight against the predominantly Sunni militants from the radical Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) who have taken over Mosul and other northern provinces, chant slogans in Kerbala June 14, 2014.

REUTERS - Children, who fled from violence in Mosul, hold bottles of water at a camp on the outskirts of Arbil in Iraq's Kurdistan region June 13, 2014.

REUTERS - A boy, who fled from violence in Mosul, washes his head at a camp on the outskirts of Arbil in Iraq's Kurdistan region June 13, 2014.

REUTERS - Volunteers who have joined the Iraqi army to fight against the predominantly Sunni militants from the radical Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) who have taken over Mosul and other northern provinces, ride a bus in Baghdad, June 14, 2014.

Daily Photo Galleries

Editors Picks Photo Galleries

Traveling by Jeep, boat and foot, Tribune-Review investigative reporter Carl Prine and photojournalist Justin Merriman covered nearly 2,000 miles over two months along the border with Mexico to report on coyotes — the human traffickers who bring illegal immigrants into the United States. Most are Americans working for money and/or drugs. This series reports how their operations have a major impact on life for residents and the environment along the border — and beyond.

CAIRO — Iraq's sectarian meltdown threatens national borders drawn by European diplomats more than a century ago.

More ominously — for the United States, the West and others — it is a “huge” victory for Islamists that could destabilize many nations, analysts say.

“What I think we are seeing now is the beginning … of the breakup of the state of Iraq,” said Steven Cook, a fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York.

“The magnitude of this is great. It is not something that happens every once in a while, and it has been building for some time now.”

With lightning speed and help from Iraq's Sunni Muslims, the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, or ISIS, has seized much of northern Iraq and seems poised to attack the capital, Baghdad.

For more than a year, the terrorist group has battled Syria's Assad regime, as well as Syrian rebels it judged to be insufficiently Islamist; its tactics are so brutal and radical that al-Qaida chastised and repudiated it.

About 6,000 ISIS fighters invaded Iraq's second-largest city, Mosul, and 30,000 Iraqi soldiers ran. The terrorists seized $420 million from Mosul's main bank and paraded through the city with captured U.S.-made military uniforms, weapons, vehicles and other equipment.

Kurdish troops, known as peshmerga, are opposing ISIS and captured portions of oil-rich Kirkuk province, which some observers say is a precursor to declaring Kurdish independence.

That would alarm Turkey and Iran, which have restive Kurdish minorities.

Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki called on Shiite Muslim militias and volunteers to defend Baghdad; Iranian troops reportedly are moving in to help defend a fellow Shiite government.

In Mosul, ISIS issued a 16-point code of conduct banning alcohol and tobacco, ordering women to stay indoors and punishing thievery with the loss of a hand or arm. Its goal is to establish an Islamic caliphate, or super-state, “to enact the law of Allah worldwide.”

Experts contacted by the Tribune-Review blame the sectarian conflagration on Maliki's authoritarian, Shiite-dominated rule that alienated Iraq's Sunnis and Kurds.

It is a “huge defeat” for Maliki and a “humiliation for the Iraqi state and security apparatus, which was built from scratch by the Americans after the 2003 invasion,” said Fawaz Gerges, a professor at the London School of Economics and expert on jihadi groups.

“Maliki said he was the strong man, the one who could stand up to ISIS” during recent Iraqi elections, Gerges said. “Now the emperor is naked.”

He said ISIS' sweeping advance is “a huge event for the (jihadist) family: They control almost 50 percent of Iraqi territory … (and) huge chunks of Syria.”

“Now they are going to psychologically play it up very big,” he explained. “They will say, ‘We are exacting vengeance. We are defeating the Shia state' … pouring gas on the roaring sectarian fire” between Sunnis and Shias across the Mideast.

Murderously repressed for decades in Iraq and only slightly less so in Turkey and Iran, Kurds have longed for independence.

“Now they have Kirkuk, and that is a big deal in terms of energy. It is going to be very hard to get Kirkuk out of their hands,” he said. “This is their opportunity, and who can blame them?”

ISIS' gains are “a fragile state on sand,” Gerges said, but “they don't have to keep the land; they just have show … many young Sunnis in Lebanon, Jordan, Syria and the gulf that ISIS could take over parts of the Iraqi state.”

And with Syria's civil war now engulfing Iraq, Islamist radicals can claim to be broadly on the march, according to Aaron Zelin, a fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy and expert on Islamic politics.

“For budding jihadists worldwide, the continued battlefield victories registered by ISIS and the perception that the ‘will of God' is on its side against numerically superior enemies will only enhance the prestige of joining the group and furthering its goals,” Zelin wrote last week.

Betsy Hiel is the Tribune-Review's foreign correspondent. Email her at bhiel@tribweb.com.

TribLive commenting policy

You are solely responsible for your comments and by using TribLive.com you agree to our Terms of Service.

We moderate comments. Our goal is to provide substantive commentary for a general readership. By screening submissions, we provide a space where readers can share intelligent and informed commentary that enhances the quality of our news and information.

While most comments will be posted if they are on-topic and not abusive, moderating decisions are subjective. We will make them as carefully and consistently as we can. Because of the volume of reader comments, we cannot review individual moderation decisions with readers.

We value thoughtful comments representing a range of views that make their point quickly and politely. We make an effort to protect discussions from repeated comments  either by the same reader or different readers.

We follow the same standards for taste as the daily newspaper. A few things we won't tolerate: personal attacks, obscenity, vulgarity, profanity (including expletives and letters followed by dashes), commercial promotion, impersonations, incoherence, proselytizing and SHOUTING. Don't include URLs to Web sites.

We do not edit comments. They are either approved or deleted. We reserve the right to edit a comment that is quoted or excerpted in an article. In this case, we may fix spelling and punctuation.

We welcome strong opinions and criticism of our work, but we don't want comments to become bogged down with discussions of our policies and we will moderate accordingly.

We appreciate it when readers and people quoted in articles or blog posts point out errors of fact or emphasis and will investigate all assertions. But these suggestions should be sent via e-mail. To avoid distracting other readers, we won't publish comments that suggest a correction. Instead, corrections will be made in a blog post or in an article.

Total Promotional Solutions

A division of Trib Total Media is your one-stop-shop for all of your branded merchandise needs.

We specialize in providing quality affordable promotional products for every type of business including non-profits, schools, universities, sports teams and more. With 1000’s of products to choose from, our knowledgeable staff can help you find the perfect apparel item or product to suit your needs and budget.

Digital Sales

We offer a wide variety of traditional and new digital advertising options customized to fit your needs!

Whether you're just starting out, or you've been a keystone in the community for years, our knowledgeable staff can provide you with a customized package including online banners/advertisements, Social Media Marketing (Facebook / Twitter), Website development, Search Engine Optimization, Email Marketing solutions and much more!

Contact your local sales rep today for details, personalized proposal and a meeting to discuss how we can meet your needs.